Market turbo-charged by triple whammy

The Chinese striding into the BHP Billiton move on Rio Tinto; Microsoft bidding for Yahoo; and now comes a report that a consortium of banks is putting together a rescue package for the troubled US monoline insurers.

With all this, the FTSE 100 has now moved well above the 6000 level, and is now sitting 155.8 points higher at 6035.6.

So much for Friday as a slow news day. No sooner had traders digested the fact that China's Chinalco had snapped up 12% of Rio Tinto, up 780p to £57.36, than they were faced with a $44.6bn bid from Microsoft for Yahoo. Now CNBC is reporting that eight banks are involved in a rescue package for the insurers, with these said to include Citigroup, UBS, Royal Bank of Scotland and - well, well - scandal hit Societe Generale.